At their final London show last week, Neil McCormick wrote that the night had been surprisingly unsentimental. However, this was not entirely the case in Birmingham.

Famed for once biting the head off a live bat on stage (though he later admitted that he thought the bat was rubber at the time), Osbourne, 68, signed off with a performance of their 1970 classic, Paranoid, and thanked fans as balloons and confetti rained down.